Apple appeals to Supreme Court

[Shane R]

Originally Posted by alanHd

My understanding is that this type of attack could take just minutes to unlock the phone.

Only if it's a 4 digit passcode. If it's truly complex, numbers and characters, they won't be able to get access to it.

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by alanHd

From what I read the FBI don't want apple to unlock the phone, they want apple to modify the software so they can try a brute force password attempt without
The phone wiping itself, having to manually enter the password attempts or wait between password attempts.

My understanding is that this type of attack could take just minutes to unlock the phone.

That's how I understand it too. The FBI wants the new OS from Apple so the FBI can modify the phone and eventually gain access. The FBI does the hacking. Possibly, the FBI will keep the new OS to use on other phones if needed. Since this phone is evidence and must maintain chain-of-custody, Apple won't have access to it.

[alanHd]

Originally Posted by Shane R

Only if it's a 4 digit passcode. If it's truly complex, numbers and characters, they won't be able to get access to it.

The article I read on the BBC website did state in this case they were dealing with a 4 digit passcode with a possible 10 000 combinations.

Maybe one of the things to come from this will be minimum 8 digit unlock codes with letters and numbers, not sure how many possible combinations there would be then. Maybe someone else could tell me.

[John F]

Originally Posted by alanHd

The article I read on the BBC website did state in this case they were dealing with a 4 digit passcode with a possible 10 000 combinations.

Maybe one of the things to come from this will be minimum 8 digit unlock codes with letters and numbers, not sure how many possible combinations there would be then. Maybe someone else could tell me.

A lot.

[alanHd]

Originally Posted by John F

A lot.

Ive just googled it for fun, the answer given was 6.63 quadrillion. The funny thing is on the site I read the answer, the people were stating that 8 digit passwords are not secure enough against brute force attacks, they recommend 10 at least.

This makes me wonder how secure my fingerprint unlock is on my phone.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by alanHd

Ive just googled it for fun, the answer given was 6.63 quadrillion. The funny thing is on the site I read the answer, the people were stating that 8 digit passwords are not secure enough against brute force attacks, they recommend 10 at least.

This makes me wonder how secure my fingerprint unlock is on my phone.

It's not if they got your phone and your finger.

[alanHd]

Originally Posted by kennyc

It's not if they got your phone and your finger.

Wouldn't it be illegal for them to force you to unlock your phone.

Without wanting to take this thread off topic here is an interesting article about brute force attacks. It claims to be able to do 350 billion-guess-per-second,
http://arstechnica.com/security/2012...rd-in-6-hours/

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by alanHd

Wouldn't it be illegal for them to force you to unlock your phone.

....

No one said anything about you being there....

[Purple Lady]

Originally Posted by kennyc

No one said anything about you being there....

Or you could be there, just not alive.

[alanHd]

Originally Posted by kennyc

No one said anything about you being there....

That made me

[dgatwood]

Originally Posted by kennyc

It's not if they got your phone and your finger.

But only within the first 48 hours, and only if nobody powers it completely off.

[John F]

Originally Posted by alanHd

Ive just googled it for fun, the answer given was 6.63 quadrillion. The funny thing is on the site I read the answer, the people were stating that 8 digit passwords are not secure enough against brute force attacks, they recommend 10 at least.

This makes me wonder how secure my fingerprint unlock is on my phone.

6.63 quadrillion doesn't sound right? Did you mean 6.63e69?

Edit: nevermind, I was assuming a maximum length and characters allowed in an IOS password.

[alanHd]

Originally Posted by John F

6.63 quadrillion doesn't sound right? Did you mean 6.63e69?

I just copied what was on the site, they did give the math but I never bothered to read it, I was just after the final figure.

[latepaul]

Originally Posted by alanHd

Ive just googled it for fun, the answer given was 6.63 quadrillion. The funny thing is on the site I read the answer, the people were stating that 8 digit passwords are not secure enough against brute force attacks, they recommend 10 at least.

It all depends on the system being used. The iPhone has to query the hardware for a key and even with the proposed software update that the FBI have requested there's an 80ms delay. Which means that if you use the already available 6-character alphanumeric passcode it would take 6.5 years to try all possibilities.

I suspect the advice about 10 digits (or characters?) was based on a system where you can retry as quickly as you can generate the next value.

[tomsem]

John McAfee has offered to hack the phone for free. Says it will take them 3 weeks. Hard to know what to make of that, but if that's possible then Apple's security is not as good as they say it is.